The aim of this paper was to assess the influence of diet on the concentrations of total mercury (HgTOT) in the eggs of aquatic birds. Trophic level was determined using stable isotopes (δ¹⁵N, δ¹³C). Analysis was carried out on eggs (laid in 2010–2012) belonging to two species of terns nesting at the River Vistula outlet on the Gulf of Gdansk and on herring gulls nesting both in Gdynia harbour and on the Vistula dam in Wloclawek. The results show that seafood diet causes the highest load of mercury, that which is transferred into terns eggs. The amounts of accumulated mercury obtained were found to be different in the particular egg components with Hgₐₗbᵤₘₑₙ > Hgyₒₗₖ > Hgₘₑₘbᵣₐₙₑ > Hgₛₕₑₗₗ. In the herring gull eggs, three stages of embryo development with varying levels of mercury were determined. It was observed that mercury received from the albumen and yolk was most effectively removed when developing embryo into down.

Links between environmental chemicals and human health have emerged, but the effects on self-rated health were less studied. Therefore, it was aimed to study the relationships of different sets of urinary environmental chemicals and the self-rated health in a national and population-based study in recent years. Data was retrieved from the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys, 2011–2012, including demographics, serum measurements, lifestyle factors, self-rated health (with two grouping approaches) and urinary environmental chemical concentrations. T test and survey-weighted logistic regression modeling were performed. Among American adults aged 12–80 (n = 6833), 5892 people had reported their general health condition. Two thousand three hundred sixty-nine (40.2 %) people reported their general health condition as excellent or very good while 3523 (59.8 %) reported good, fair, or poor. People who reported their general health condition as good, fair, or poor had higher levels of urinary arsenic, heavy metals (including cadmium, cobalt, manganese, molybdenum, lead, antimony, strontium, tungsten and uranium), phthalates, pesticides and polyaromatic hydrocarbons but lower levels of benzophenone-3 and triclosan. There were no associations with urinary parabens, perchlorate, nitrate, thiocyanate or polyfluorinated compounds. However, only urinary cadmium, benzophenone-3, triclosan, and 2-hydroxynaphthalene remained significant when comparing between “good to excellent” and “poor to fair.” This is the first time observing risk associations of urinary arsenic, heavy metal, phthalate, pesticide, and hydrocarbon concentrations and self-rated health in people aged 12–80, although the causality cannot be established. Further elimination of these environmental chemicals in humans might need to be considered in health and environmental policies.

It is necessary to find an effective soil remediation technology for the simultaneous removal of hydrophobic organic contaminants and heavy metals from contaminated soils. In this work, a novel cysteine-β-cyclodextrin (CCD) was synthesized by the reaction of β-cyclodextrin with cysteine, and the structure of CCD was confirmed by ¹H-NMR, ¹³C-NMR, FT-IR spectroscopy and elemental analysis. Pot-culture experiments were conducted to investigate the effects of CCD on the phytoremediation of soil co-contaminated with phenanthrene and lead. The results showed that CCD can enhance the phytoremediation of soil co-contaminated with phenanthrene and lead. When CCD was added to the co-contaminated soil, the concentrations of phenanthrene and Pb in roots and shoots of ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) significantly increased, the presence of CCD is beneficial to the accumulation of phenanthrene and Pb in ryegrass, and the residual concentrations of phenanthrene and Pb in soils significantly decreased. Under the co-contamination of 500 mg Pb kg⁻¹ and 50 mg PHE kg⁻¹, the bioconcentration factor of phenanthrene and Pb in the presence of CCD was increased by 1.43-fold and 4.47-fold, respectively. After CCD was added to the contaminated soils, the residual concentration of phenanthrene and Pb in unplanted soil was decreased by 18 and 25 %, respectively. However, for the planted soil, the residual concentration of phenanthrene and Pb was decreased by 48 and 56 %, respectively. CCD may improve the bioavailability of phenanthrene and Pb in co-contaminated soil; CCD enhanced phytoremediation technology may be a good alternative for the removal of hydrophobic organic contaminants and heavy metals from contaminated soils.

This study aimed to investigate the emission and multimedia fate as well as potential risks of triclosan (TCS) in all of 58 basins in China. The results showed that the total usage of TCS in whole China was 100 t/year, and the discharge to the receiving environment was estimated to be 66.1 t/year. The predicted TCS concentrations by the level III fugacity model were within an order of magnitude of the reported measured concentrations. TCS (90.8 %) was discharged into the water compartment and 9.2 % to the soil compartment. The TCS concentration levels in east China were found generally higher than in west China. In addition, the input flux for TCS to seawater was largely attributed to the seasonal variations in advection flows. Preliminary risk assessment showed that medium to high ecological risks for TCS would be expected in the eastern part of China due to the high population density.

The decrease of ice cover in the Arctic will lead to an increase of ship traffic in the upcoming decades. Consequently, oil pollution is expected. In this context, the goals of this study were to evaluate the biological impact of marine diesel contamination and, on this basis, to determine analytical tools of interest (biomarkers) for future biomonitoring of diesel spills. Using a 7-day contamination protocol, this study investigated biochemical modulations in the digestive gland of the Iceland scallop (Chlamys islandica). Incorporation of contaminants was verified assessing haemolymph metabolites. Results showed a response of glutathione-S-transferase to contamination suggesting detoxification processes and the suitability of such a tool for diesel spill biomonitoring. The lack of modulation of superoxide dismutase activity and lipid peroxidation suggests no oxidative stress and the unsuitability of these molecular tools for biomonitoring.

Nitrate contamination in groundwater is a worldwide problem especially in agricultural countries. Environmental factors, such as land-use pattern, type of aquifer, and soil-drainage capacity, affect the level of contamination. Exposure to high levels of nitrate in groundwater may contribute to adverse health effects among residents who use groundwater for consumption. This study aimed to determine the relationship between nitrate levels in groundwater with land-use pattern, type of aquifer, and soil-drainage capacity, in Photharam District, Ratchaburi Province, lower Mae Klong basin, Thailand. Health risk maps were created based on hazard quotient to quantify the potential health risk of the residents using US Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) health risk assessment model. The results showed the influence of land-use patterns, type of aquifer, and soil-drainage capacity on nitrate contamination. It was found that most of the residents in the studied area were not at risk; however, a groundwater nitrate monitoring system should be implemented.

Although the aquaculture of spiny lobsters has been expanding since the 1970s, very little is known about the potential environmental impacts on water quality of this activity. This study quantified the production of dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) from Australasian red spiny lobsters, Jasus edwardsii, in the laboratory, and these data were then used in a numerical model to predict the dispersal pattern of DIN from a hypothetical commercial spiny lobster farm for a coastal site where such a farm would typically be located. Modelling scenarios were set up with combinations of two different stocking densities (3 and 5 kg m⁻³), two different diets (mussels and moist artificial diet) and three different feed conversion ratios (FCR = 3, 5 and 28). DIN excretion rate from unfed lobsters in the laboratory on average was 1.10 ± 0.12 μg N g⁻¹ h⁻¹ while feeding lobsters on mussels and artificial diet increased DIN excretion significantly by around eightfold and twofold, respectively. Ammonia was consistently the dominant contributor to measured DIN output from lobsters. Modelling results indicated that the mean elevated DIN from a hypothetical farm where the lobsters were fed with mussels ranged from 7 up to 20 μg N L⁻¹ with increasing stocking density and FCR and was 30–150 % higher than the mean elevated DIN resulting from lobsters fed with artificial diet. Overall, the results indicated that DIN output from the hypothetical spiny lobster sea-cage farming is unlikely to be problematic using the FCR, stocking density, and the number of cages modelled at the coastal site in this study. Furthermore, feeding lobsters with artificial diet can help maintain a lower DIN output than seafood, such as mussels or trash fish.

The Cadmium (Cd) accumulation capacity and subcellular distribution in the mining ecotype (ME) and non-mining ecotype (NME) of Kyllinga brevifolia Rottb were investigated in pot experiments. The results showed that average Cd contents in shoots of the two ecotypes of K. brevifolia were higher than those in roots, whereas Cd concentrations in roots were greater than those in shoots. Also, shoot Cd contents in NME of K. brevifolia were 1.65–45.45 times greater than those in ME when the plants were grown at 5, 25, 50, and 100 mg Cd kg⁻¹soil. Moreover, Cd contents in the roots in NME were 1.75–45.45 times higher than those in ME. Subcellular distribution of Cd demonstrated that the majority of Cd in the two ecotypes of K. brevifolia was distributed in the cell walls and soluble fraction, and a small percentage of Cd existed in organelle fraction. In addition, proportions of Cd distributed in shoots and roots cell walls of NME were greater than those in ME. It could be assumed that compared with ME, NME of K. brevifolia has better Cd accumulation capacity, and the subcellular distribution of Cd might be one of the mechanisms to explain such phenomena.

A methane-producing microbial electrolysis cell (MEC) was continuously fed at the anode with a synthetic solution of soluble organic compounds simulating the composition of the soluble fraction of a municipal wastewater. The MEC performance was assessed at different anode potentials in terms of chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal efficiency, methane production, and energy efficiency. As a main result, about 72–80 % of the removed substrate was converted into current at the anode, and about 84–86 % of the current was converted into methane at the cathode. Moreover, even though both COD removed and methane production slightly decreased as the applied anode potential decreased, the energy efficiency (i.e., the energy recovered as methane with respect to the energy input into the system) increased from 54 to 63 %. Denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) analyses revealed a high diversity in the anodic bacterial community with the presence of both fermentative (Proteiniphilum acetatigenes and Petrimonas sulphurifila) and aerobic (Rhodococcus qingshengii) microorganisms, whereas only two microorganisms (Methanobrevibacter arboriphilus and Methanosarcina mazei), both assignable to methanogens, were observed in the cathodic community.

Optical and micro-physical features of aerosol are reported using Skyradiometer (POM-01L, Prede, Japan) observations taken from a high-altitude station Merak, located in north-eastern Ladakh of the western trans-Himalayas region during January 2011 to December 2013. The observed daily mean aerosol optical depth (AOD, at 500 nm) at the site varied from 0.01 to 0.14. However, 75 % of the observed AOD lies below 0.05 during the study period. Seasonal peaks of AOD occurred in spring as 0.06 and minimum in winter as 0.03 which represents the aged background aerosols at the site. Yearly mean AOD at 500 nm is found to be around 0.04 and inter-annual variations of AOD is very small (nearly ±0.01). Angstrom exponent (a) varied seasonally from 0.73 in spring to 1.5 in autumn. About 30 % of the observed a lies below 0.8 which are the indicative for the presence of coarse-mode aerosols at the site. The station exhibits absorbing aerosol features which prominently occurred during spring and that may be attributed by the transported anthropogenic aerosol from Indo-Gangatic Plain (IGP). Results were well substantiated with the air mass back-trajectory analysis. Furthermore, seasonal mean of single scattering albedo (SSA at 500 nm) varied from of 0.94 to 0.98 and a general increasing trend is noticed from 400 to 870 nm wavelengths. These features are apparently regional characteristics of the site. Aerosol asymmetry factor (AS) decreases gradually from 400 to 870 nm and varied from 0.66 to 0.69 at 500 nm across the seasons. Dominance of desert-dust aerosols, associated by coarse mode, is indicated by tri-modal features of aerosol volume size distribution over the station during the entire seasons.